Wednesday, August 10

Shades of the Occult! FARS misspells name of German research center "Firil" as "Vril"

1871 book cover for The Coming Race

Dear FARS! I am grateful for your war reporting but please kindly provide links at least for your primary source documents! This so overworked bloggers such as Pundita don't have to chase around the internet playing detective.

However comma the gaffe provided me with a much-needed laugh when I tried to track down a German research firm according to the misspelling of Vril. There is only one known Vril associated with Germany -- or with anything else, for that matter. From Wikipedia's article on Vril:

The Coming Race is an 1871 novel by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, reprinted as Vril, the Power of the Coming Race. Among its readers have been those who believed that its account of a superior subterranean master race and the energy-form called "Vril" was accurate, to the extent that some Theosophists, notably Helena Blavatsky, William Scott-Elliot, and Rudolf Steiner, accepted the book as being (at least in part) based on occult truth.[1]

A book, The Morning of the Magicians (1960), suggested that a secret Vril Society existed in pre-Nazi Berlin. However, there is no evidence for the existence of such a society. ...

Lucky for me another website was interested in the same report from the German firm, so I'm going to run with their version even though they're specifically interested in the number of Jordanian fighters currently in Syria.

Alas, there is actually no link to Firil in the report. This might be because (from the Google translation from Arabic to English) it *seems* Firil is a project of the Ferrell Center for Studies in Berlin; Firil *seems* to be run by one Dr Jameel Shaheen, who did the study that is the subject of the following report. And no. I was unable to find a link to a Ferrell Center in Berlin. As to Dr Shaheen's qualifications to conduct the study -- perhaps I can put this question to Charlotte's dear departed bookie if I can wrest my Ouija board from her claws. Also, for readers who want to get into the weeds on the story of foreign fighters in Syria, the FARS version of the report mentions a (U.K.) Telegraph report, which FARS didn't identify by title or provide a link for, but it was easy to find:Leaked Islamic State files reveal the 'borders chief' who helped funnel terrorists into Syria

That borders chief turned out to be involved in helping facilitate the November 2015 massacre in Paris.

Dr. Jameel Shaheen, who conducted the study, said that "The group of foreign fighters, of all nationalities, who have fought against the Syrian Arab Army from April 2011 until the end of 2015, numbered at 360,000."

The number also includes "men and women, anyone who has participated in fighting in a direct manner, or through military or logistical support, doctors, nurses, Jihadi wives. 95,000 of this group has been killed."

The current number of foreign fighters in Syria totals 90,000. The largest number of foreign fighters belongs to Daesh and Nusra Front (Fateh al-Sham). The number of fighters who have European or American nationality is 21,500 and only 8,500 of this group have returned to their countries.

The study says this is the biggest group of foreign fighters in history comprising of 93 nationalities from across the world and five continents. They came from every single Arab country without exception.

[Pundita note: This tally roughly comports with the Syrian tally of the number of foreign countries represented in Syria (100) and the U.S. military tally of 80 countries.]

According to the study, Turkey occupies the number one spot in the total of foreign fighters. That includes soldiers and officers from both the Turkish Army and Turkish intelligence apparatus, and the various Turkish groups fighting in the conflict.

The Turkish Army has lost 350 soldiers, officers and pilots in the conflict.

The largest group of militants is the Saudis, having contributed 24,500 Saudi fighters - 5990 of whom have died.

The largest number of women in this group is the Tunisians, who contributed 180 women and teenagers to "Jihadi marriage". 45 of them have died.

An interesting point is that 2015 saw a sharp rise in the number of Islamic militants coming from Central Asia.

In terms of financing, approximately 45 billion dollars has been sent to support military operations against the Syrian Arab Army.

Daesh pays its fighters more than any other group, the Free Syrian Army occupies last place in this regard. Their salaries stopped about two years ago when foreign support ended.

The study includes the period between April 2, 2011 and January 31, 2016.

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